


Forbidden Fruit

by RinaRose



Series: The McDonald Family [2]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Families of Choice, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Found Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, allergic reactions, but i promise everyone is okay, it's dark for a moment y'all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:14:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25071463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RinaRose/pseuds/RinaRose
Summary: Angus has an allergic reaction.Taako has a panic attack.Lup takes care of everything like the boss she is.Merle does some healing.Kravitz is a supportive boyfriend/coparent.
Relationships: Angus McDonald & Taako, Kravitz/Taako (The Adventure Zone), Lup & Angus McDonald, Lup & Taako (The Adventure Zone)
Series: The McDonald Family [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1855021
Comments: 17
Kudos: 167





	Forbidden Fruit

**Author's Note:**

> I love the father/son dynamic of Angus and Taako so of course I had to put them in the most angsty situation I could think of.  
> Disclaimer: I have never had a panic attack or a severe allergic reaction so I don't really know what I'm writing about 🤷🏻  
> It seems sadistic to say 'enjoy this angst' but please enjoy the copious amounts of fluff in the second half.
> 
> I originally wanted this to be one chapter in a 5+1 fic about Angus and Taako, but when it turned out to be 4k words I decided to leave it as a one shot. Then I got such good feedback about it that I decided to go ahead and sell my soul to writing the whole thing. This will eventually be chapter 5 of The Making of the McDonald Family. You can read the other work in this series for the whole thing, or read this one as a standalone. Or both, or neither, I don't control your decisions.

Pineapples are rare on this planet, or at least, they aren’t common on this part of Faerun. Honestly, it’s been years since Taako has seen a pineapple, so when he comes across a vendor selling them at the local market, he buys as many as he can carry. He has a great recipe for pineapple upside-down cake that he hasn’t made in literal decades.

Angus sits at the kitchen counter, helping with small tasks here and there. Taako won’t admit it, but he likes teaching Angus. The kid was quick to pick up magic, and he’s quick to pick up cooking too. He’s eager to learn just about anything, and Taako loves the attention that comes with being a teacher, so it works out for them both.

Taako is putting the cake into the oven, after having carefully layered the rings of pineapple into the pan. “This is gonna be great, Ango. I haven’t had real pineapple in way too long.”

“I’ve never tried a pineapple before,” Angus tells him, and Taako’s eyebrows shoot up.

“Seriously? We’ve been making this cake for 20 minutes and you haven’t stolen a piece of pineapple yet? Who raised you?” Taako exclaims with fake indignation.

“Sorry sir. I didn’t know if you would have extra, so I didn’t take any.” Only Angus would apologize for _not_ stealing Taako’s food.

“Well lucky you, we do have extra. Help yourself,” Taako pushes the bowl of leftover pineapple rings toward Angus, scooping one out for himself and popping it into his mouth with a satisfied slurp.

Angus dips his fingers into the bowl, trying to pluck out some pineapple without getting juice all over his hands, and failing. Taako only laughs. Angus manages to pick up one of the slippery pieces of fruit and take a bite, immediately making a face at the tartness. Taako laughs harder. It only takes a second for Angus to get over the sharp taste before he chews and swallows.

“Mmm, you’re right, that was delicious, sir!” he says, full of enthusiasm.

“Chya, of course I’m right little dude,” Taako responds with a smirk. He turns toward the mess left on the counter, starting to clean up. Angus reaches for another slice of the juicy yellow fruit and takes a bite.

Suddenly, Angus doesn’t feel very good. It sweeps over him like a wave. He feels sweaty and strange. Once, when he was younger and traveling on his own, he had gone too long without eating and had fainted. Right before it happened, Angus had suddenly felt a foreboding sense of dread, like he wanted to cry for no reason; that’s how he feels now, and he knows it can’t be good. Then a cough rises in his throat and an itch breaks out across his skin like a shiver running down his spine. This is really not good.

“Um, sir,” he tries to say, but it comes out raspy. There are too many strange sensations happening at once that he doesn’t even notice the swelling in his throat until he tries to speak. He still doesn’t register the tears running down his face, or the red bumps on his arms; but Taako does, when he turns at the sound of Angus’s voice.

The glass bowl he was carrying to the sink shatters on the ground as it slips from Taako’s hands.

“Fuck,” is all he says, quietly, as if he just realized he forgot an ingredient in his recipe. And then, louder, “Fuck. Angus!” and he’s stepping over broken glass, rushing to the boy’s side, grabbing his arms and looking into his face to try and find what’s wrong. His eyes flick frantically from Angus’s tear streaked face to the hives now welling up on his neck too. His mind works frantically to piece together what happened. There are tears streaming from Taako’s eyes now too, but neither of them notice; Angus closes his eyes as he coughs and wheezes and gasps for air.

“Ango, what… I didn’t… shit, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to…” Taako seems to start a million sentences but doesn’t finish any of them as his mind races. And then just as suddenly as he dropped the bowl, he drops Angus’s arms and turns on his heels, rushing to the other side of the kitchen and rifling through the cabinet above the sink, muttering “fuck, fuck, fuck,” until he finds what he was looking for – a tiny bottle of potion. Because of course Taako keeps anti-poison in his kitchen.

He practically shoves the bottle to Angus’s lips, forcing him to drink it. It’s okay; Angus has very little control over his shaking fingers at this point, and wouldn’t have been able to hold the bottle if he tried.

The initial adrenaline of the situation is starting to wear off for Taako, and is giving way to something much deeper. Existential dread and panic is starting to creep into his mind, his heart. His vision is tunneling, Angus's hive-covered face the only thing he can seem to focus on. The raspiness of Angus's breath is the only thing he can hear above the rush of his own blood in his ears. There's a clenching weight in his chest and his own breathing is labored now too, as if he too is having a reaction. He poisoned Angus, _he poisoned Angus,_ his mind is screaming at him, blocking out any logical thoughts, so he does the only logical thing left. He screams for his sister.

Lup’s blood runs cold when she hears Taako scream her name from the kitchen. She hasn’t heard him in such distress since… well, ever. Even during their most catastrophic missions, Taako always deflects and plays down the situation. She knows something is seriously wrong. She’s upstairs in her room, but she makes it to the kitchen in under five seconds.

She takes in the scene – the broken glass on the floor, an empty bottle of anti-poison in her brother’s shaking hand, the boy with hives now on every visible part of his body – and seems to understand immediately. Thank Istus that Lup stays so cool under pressure. (Later, when Angus is recovering, Taako will express this exact thought to her. The only words out of his mouth will be “Thanks, Lulu,” but she speaks fluent Twin and knows exactly what he means. He will hug her so tight she thinks she might break, even though she knows he is the broken one right now. So she’ll hug him and hold him while he lets out the emotions he normally tries so hard to hold inside. But that will be later.)

A scythe appears in Lup’s hand out of nowhere, and for the tiniest millisecond there is true horror in Taako’s eyes. But then she turns away from the scene in the kitchen and uses her scythe to tear a hole in the fabric of reality. She steps through it, and mere moments later she returns, literally carrying Merle by the collar of his fantasy-Hawaiian shirt.

“I don’t know what happened, but you need to heal him,” Lup explains. To his credit, Merle catches on quick. He spends just a moment surveying the scene before pulling out his Extreme Teen Bible and making his way to Angus.

The total elapsed time since Angus ate the pineapple has been 3 minutes and 48 seconds.

In the time that Lup was getting Merle, Taako somehow ended up on the floor, with Angus lying half in his lap. Angus himself is close to unconsciousness at this point. He’s found one of Taako’s hands with his own and is holding on for dear life, but that’s about the only thing outside of his own body that he can focus on.

Merle makes his way over to them, flipping through his bible in search of a healing spell. He tries to ask Taako about what happened, so he can choose the best spell for the job, but he doesn’t get many answers. He spots the empty bottle of anti-poison, now rolling helplessly on the floor next to Taako.

“It was poison?” Merle asks. Taako turns ghostly pale and doesn’t answer.

Lup chimes in, “If it was poison, the potion would have helped. It has to be something else. They were baking together, Angus must have eaten something he was allergic to.”

“Ah, allergies. Well, that’s better than poison!” Merle chuckles, and Lup elbows him in the ribs. He mutters for a moment, turning back to the book in his lap and flipping to a new page. When he finds what he’s looking for, he glances up at Taako, who looks almost as worse for wear as Angus.

“I got the kid, Lup. You take care of your brother,” he tells her.

Lup meets Merle’s eyes for a moment. She’s putting a lot of trust in Merle to not fuck up while healing Angus, but deep down she knows he can do this. She nods, turning toward Taako, who is still grasping Angus’s hand and hovering over the boy.

“Hey, Koko,” she says, laying her hands on his shoulders. She sounds so calm and steady compared to the storm of panic and chaos going on inside Taako’s brain.

“Give him space. You need to let Merle do his work. Angus will be okay.”

Taako meets Lup’s eyes for the first time, and he looks so utterly lost.

“Lup,” his voice is barely above a whisper. “I didn’t mean to hurt him. I only used a little magic, I thought it was safe. I thought it was safe.”

“You didn’t hurt him. He’s having an allergic reaction. This isn’t your fault, Taako.”  
“I… I still fed him the pineapples.” His voice breaks.

Lup knows what happened at Glamour Springs; she knows what this is really about, why this is hitting Taako so hard. She needs to get him out of this kitchen so he can start to calm down. But when she starts to pull his hands, he refuses to stand up, shaking his head.

“No, I won’t leave him,” he protests.

Lup turns back to Merle and Angus. By now, Merle has finished the spell he was working on; the hives across Angus’s skin are starting to fade, and his breathing has evened out. He’s now very clearly unconscious, but at least he seems to be out of the woods.

“He’ll be okay,” Merle reassures. “He’ll need to rest, and you’ll have to watch him. He could have a secondary reaction in a few hours. I’ll make some potions to give him if it happens again, and some he’ll have to drink when he wakes up. But he’ll be okay,” he says again, looking meaningfully at Taako, who nods.

“Though you should probably get him up off the floor and into bed,” Merle adds, now looking at Lup.

“I’ll do it,” Taako says before Lup can respond.

“Taako, I don’t think you should –”

“I’ll do it. He’s my… he’s mine. I’ll take him to his room,” Taako explains, scooping Angus into his arms and leaving no room for discussion.

“Fine,” Lup sighs, and she follows him out of the room just to make sure that Taako is okay carrying the boy up the stairs to his bedroom. Taako lays Angus down and sits at the edge of the bed.

“Taako, he’s okay. Are you?” she asks, but he seems not to hear her. She touches his cheek, gently turning his face so he’ll take his eyes off Angus and meet her own. “Are you okay?” she repeats.

Taako doesn’t look okay at all, but he nods. Lup sighs again.

“Okay. Stay here with him, and I’ll be right back.”

She leaves the room, going back downstairs. She takes the potions from Merle, listening to his instructions and thanking him profusely before bringing him back home. She cleans the glass off the kitchen floor and takes the ill-fated cake out of the oven before it burns the damn house down. She calls Kravitz on his stone of farspeech to tell him what happened. Kravitz is at work and offers to come home immediately, but she assures him that everything is under control. Kravitz promises to come home as soon as possible anyway. Then Lup enchants one of the comfy armchairs from the living room and floats it up the stairs into Angus’s room, where she convinces her brother to sit. If he’s going to stay by Ango’s bedside, he might as well be comfortable.

Lup squeezes herself into the chair next to Taako and holds her brother close while he cries and Angus sleeps.

Angus loves his bedroom. The walls are painted sea green, his favorite color; he has his own desk and three big bookcases; and Taako showed him how to cast prestidigitation on the ceiling so that it glows with constellations at night. The stars glow above him when he opens his eyes. The world’s greatest detective notices a few strange things in his room. First, an armchair from the living room sits by the bed, and second, his basically-dad sits in the armchair with his eyes closed. Oh, and his throat feels sore and his skin feels weirdly prickly. Angus takes a deep breath and starts to sit up, and Taako’s eyes snap open.

“What happened?” Angus manages to ask.

“You’re allergic to pineapple,” Taako says wryly, before softening his tone. “How do you feel, sweetheart?”

_Sweetheart_? Angus is used to Taako’s pet names for him, but they’re never this affectionate. In fact, most of the time Taako’s nicknames are goofs at Angus’s expense. What happened that could possibly make Taako call Angus sweetheart?

Angus remembers helping Taako in the kitchen. Eating the tart pineapple. The hives on his skin, the swelling in his throat, gasping for breath. Oh yeah, that’s what happened.

“I feel okay. My throat feels sore, and my skin feels a little prickly. But I can breathe alright, so I guess I’m okay.”

Just then Lup appears in the open doorway.

“Did I hear Angus?” she asks, stepping into the room. “Hey, look who’s awake!” she says when Angus turns to look at her, and her smile is so relieved and genuine that it makes Angus smile too.

“Yeah, bubeleh’s awake. Hey, Merle left some shit for you to drink when you woke up, let me go grab those for you. Stay here with him, Lulu,” Taako says, getting up and heading for the door.

“Sure thing,” Lup says, taking the seat Taako just left. Once Taako is out of the room, her face turns serious.

“Are you sure you’re okay, Ango?”

“Yeah, I’m okay, Auntie Lup. But um, is Taako okay? He doesn’t look great.” Nothing gets past the world’s greatest detective, and Taako had really been a mess. He normally takes such pride in what he looks like, but now Taako’s hair looks like it had been put into a hasty bun, his makeup is smudged, and he still wore the apron he had put on when they started baking. He has dark bags under his eyes, but Angus isn’t sure if they came from runny mascara or exhaustion. Probably both.

Lup looks a little sad, and seems to choose her words carefully before she answers.

“Taako is okay, now that you’re okay. But that really scared him, worse than I’ve ever seen. He had a panic attack.”

“Because of me?” Angus looks worried.

“Well… yes and no. Ango, do you know what happened to Taako at Glamour Springs?”  
Angus nods. Of course he knows. Everyone in the world knows.

“That really messed him up for a while. He didn’t cook for a long time, especially not for people he cared about. He was afraid that his cooking would hurt them, or worse. And when you started to have an allergic reaction, I think his mind sort of jumped to the worst, and he panicked.”

“So, he thought he… poisoned me?” now Angus is really concerned.

“Yeah. Look, I’m gonna be honest with you, Ango. Taako loves you a lot. He won’t say it, but we all know you’re like a son to him. If you died, it would break his heart. But if he thought his food is what killed you, it would break him. I don’t think he could live with that. That’s why he reacted so strongly earlier.”

“Wow,” Angus says, in a quiet voice that reminds Lup of just how young he is. Angus is so independent, so mature, so _smart_ that it’s easy to forget that he’s still a little kid.

“Did Merle say whe – ” Taako is barely two steps into the room when Angus cuts him off by practically throwing himself out of bed and into a hug.

“Pumpkin, you shouldn’t be out of bed,” Taako says, but his words are empty, because he does his best to wrap his arms around Angus while still holding Merle’s potion bottles in one hand.

“I’m sorry I scared you so much, sir.”  
“Wasn’t your fault, bubeleh.”

“Still. Um, thank you for taking care of me. I love you.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Taako pats his back, the closest he’ll get to saying he loves Angus too. “Okay, Agnes. C’mon, you have to drink this medicine.” He starts to extract himself from the hug, guiding Angus back toward the bed.

Angus is a good boy, as always, and drinks the medicine he’s given without complaint (though he does scrunch up his face at the taste, reminding Taako of only hours earlier, when he had first tasted the fruit that caused this whole mess.)

“Well, I’ll let you get some rest,” Lup says, standing from the chair. She leans over the bed to give Angus a hug of her own before leaving.

“Thanks, Auntie Lup. I love you too.”  
“I love you too, too, kiddo,” she says with a smile and a wink, nudging Taako with her elbow on the way out of the room as if to tell him, “see, it’s not that hard to say!”

Angus and Taako settle back down onto the bed and chair, respectively. Angus insists that he’s fine and doesn’t need to be watched over all night. Taako insists that he wants to make sure Angus doesn’t have any secondary allergic reactions. Guess who wins that fight.

But it’s okay; Angus doesn’t really mind, anyway. He likes knowing that Taako is there for him. Because even though he doesn’t say it with words, the fact that Taako is willing to sit there all night to keep Angus safe is proof enough that he loves him too.

Before he falls asleep, Angus asks Taako to lie down with him. Taako grumbles about it, but it’s all for show – he can’t deny Angus anything, and getting to cuddle his boy is actually nice.

When Kravitz gets home, he peeks his head into Angus’s room. Angus is asleep, but Taako waves him into the room.

“Sorry I’m so late,” Kravitz whispers. “It’s easy to lose track of time in the astral plane. Is everything okay?”

“No worries, babe. We took care of it. Or, I guess Lup took care of it while I had a panic attack, but it got taken care of anyway. Everything is okay now; we’re both alright.” He looks down at Angus affectionately. Here in the dark of the night, it’s somehow a little easier to show his emotions. Kravitz sits on the edge of the bed.

“Lay down with us.”  
“In this tiny bed?” Angus’s bed isn’t really tiny – its actually pretty large for a boy his size – but it’s tiny compared to their huge king sized bed.

“C’mon, there’s plenty of room. It’s cozy!” Kravitz smiles and lays down, with the still sleeping Angus squeezed between them.

It’s quiet for a few moments before Taako says in a whisper, “I fucking hate kids.” It’s so absurd that Kravitz actually laughs.

“No you don’t, Taako,” he replies, receiving only a glare in response. “Someone who hates kids doesn’t open a school. Or adopt a son. You can deny that all you want, but he lives with us and you're his primary caregiver, that makes him your son. He didn’t just accidentally start teaching at your school, or move in with us – you adopted Angus into your life.”

“Yeah, fine. I accidentally fell in love with him, and it fucking sucks.”  
“What do you mean?”

“It’s like having yet another piece of my heart walking around outside my body, that I have to worry about constantly. At least with you and Lup, I don’t have to worry about you dying. But Ango is just a kid. He’s so grown up, but he’s so fucking young, Krav. I have to worry about everything for him; I just want to make sure he’s okay. And if I was the one to hurt him –”

“You didn’t hurt him. You handled the situation very well, from what Lup told me.”

“That’s just it, though. I didn’t handle it. I let Lup handle it while I had a fucking panic attack.”

“You knew to get help. You did your best, given the situation, and you got help for Angus. You put his needs above your own. I know it’s hard, but that’s what it means to be a parent.”

Taako is quiet for a moment before he sighs. “Fuck. Then I hate being a parent.”

Kravitz chuckles, and Angus takes a deep breath and stirs between them.

“Love you too, dad,” he mumbles, rubbing his eyes.

“What the fuck,” Taako is indignant. “Ango, did you hear that whole conversation?”

“Mostly. You were whispering right over me!” Angus explains, still clearly very sleepy.

“You’re grounded,” Taako says, but his voice is tender. Angus knows he isn’t serious, but plays along anyway.  
“What? Noooo! Dad-vitz, help me out.” Angus uses this nickname for Kravitz sometimes when he’s being silly, and it always makes him laugh. Like Lup, Kravitz is much more open to Angus’s familial terms of endearment than Taako is.

“Don’t worry, bud. I won’t let him do that to you.”

Taako turns the conversation around, asking, “How are you feeling, pumpkin?”

“Much better, now. But I’m pretty hungry. I guess I never ate dinner.” Angus’s stomach growls right on cue.

“Well let’s go, then. I’ll make pancakes.”

“But it’s the middle of the night,” Angus protests.

“Middle of the night pancakes are the best pancakes. Have I taught you nothing, Agnes?” Angus just smiles and follows Taako out of bed and into the kitchen, Kravitz bringing up the rear.

Twenty minutes later, their little family sits at the breakfast nook, chatting and laughing together long before the sun rises. The pancakes they're eating were made completely magic-free, but no one comments on that. Lup enters the kitchen, looking every bit like an elf who doesn’t need to sleep.

“Aw hell yeah, midnight pancakes are the best pancakes!” she exclaims, grabbing a plate of her own. Taako gives her a high five for proving his point.

“What about Barry? Isn’t he left out?” Angus asks.

“You snooze, you lose. Humans sleep too much, in my opinion,” Lup responds, but Angus notices her saving a few pancakes on a plate off to the side anyway.

Earlier that day, Angus had been in this kitchen when a rush of bad feelings – fear and anxiety along with the physical reactions – had spread over him. Now, he sits in the kitchen surrounded by his family as a rush of good feelings – love, happiness, belonging – washes over. His family is not conventional by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s perfect anyway.

He looks across the table at Taako, who meets his eye and gives him a warm smile. Angus doesn’t need words to know that he is so, so loved.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Feel free to tell me how much you love Angus McDonald or just further validate me in the comments.


End file.
